Always on My Mind
by TheGreatSporkWielder
Summary: Since returning to Pemberley after his disastrous declaration of love, William Darcy has done the best he can to avoid thinking about Elizabeth Bennet. But, like most times one purposely tries to avoid thinking about something, she never truly leaves his thoughts. A Lizzie Bennet Diaries fic.


Since returning to Pemberley after his disastrous declaration of love, William Darcy has done the best he can to avoid thinking about Elizabeth Bennet. But, like most times one purposely tries to avoid thinking about something, she never truly leaves his thoughts.

When Gigi asks him to go see the new _Anna Karenina _adaptation with her, he sits in the theater and wonders what Lizzie, with her love of Russian literature, thinks of it. When he's in a board meeting two weeks before Christmas, looking over the extremely profitable end-of-the-year financial reports, he hears Lizzie's voice in his head, calling him a "very successful businessman" (is that the first time she truly complimented him? He thinks it might be, and hoards those words deep in his heart like a dragon). When Caroline insists on the three of them going to Melisse for dinner one evening, he remembers a half-formed daydream he'd once had of taking Lizzie there.

In fact, he's fairly certain that he fails just as spectacularly at _forgetting _about Lizzie as he did in trying _not _to fall in love with her.

So when he exits his office about a week into the new year to see Lizzie standing in the reception area talking to Lauren, his secretary, he wonders for a moment if Lizzie has become so intertwined with his every waking thought that he has now descended into hallucinating her. Just as he's about to pinch himself, or maybe ask a passing intern to hit him extremely hard upside the head, it dawns on him that Lizzie must be here observing for her independent study project, and before he realizes what he's doing, he's standing in front of them, and he hears himself say, "Good morning."

Both Lizzie and Lauren look startled to see him. "Mr. Darcy!" Lauren exclaims. "I didn't think you'd be back from New York for another week; I was just telling Miss Bennet. She's here to observe for her Master's in Mass Communications."

"Yes," he says, and notices Lizzie's expression becoming more and more apprehensive with every passing moment. "The negotiations didn't take nearly as long as we thought they would."

Lizzie looks as though she's contemplating which of the exits would make for a faster escape. Despite the fact that her presence here is making him feel decidedly wrong-footed in one of the few places he usually feels at ease, he doesn't want her to leave, so he blurts out the first thing he can think of: "I hope everyone in your family is well. And your sisters. And your parents. And...your family."

_Really? _he chastises himself. _That's the best thing you could think of to say? It's a wonder she doesn't think you're mentally deficient in addition to being an arrogant snob. _Judging by the confused tilt of her eyebrows as she answers that her family is fine and thanks him for asking, he imagines that Lizzie is wondering if perhaps what brains he possesses have dribbled out his ears in the months since they've last seen each other. Even Lauren is looking at him a bit oddly, and he clears his throat and nods emphatically at Lizzie. "Well," he says stiffly, "Lauren can certainly help you with anything you need during your time here."

"Thank you," she replies, matching his even tone, and he can't decipher the look in her eyes, as though she'd perhaps been expecting him to act more like a man angry about being rejected (or maybe she thought he'd lord his position here over her) and she is disappointed to find him as unreadable as he'd ever been. And yes, he was angry. But not at her. Not entirely.

(Not at all. Not anymore.)

He is angry at himself. He can easily talk projected earnings and the increasing influence of social media on trends within certain demographics, but it's as though this ability to clearly articulate his thoughts gets left behind at the office when he goes home in the evening. He curses himself for not being able to transfer his success as a businessman to social interactions. For not being able to say the words to properly express the emotions raging inside his heart (_I love you, you're lovely, please love me, too)._

But those emotions have no place here. She is not here to see _him, _no matter how much he wishes she were (in fact, she no doubt wishes he'd stayed in New York); she is here to see his company, and he's determined that her visit here will go as smoothly and painlessly as possible, even if that means he has to hole up in his office for the next month, sleeping on his couch and living off of nothing but chai and that box of organic trail mix he has stashed in his desk drawer.

(Thankfully, his couch is fairly comfortable.)

Darcy nods at her and heads back to his office, hoping that she doesn't notice the way he's surreptitiously studying the way the light plays off her hair or that he breathes in the faint but pleasing scent of her perfume as he brushes by her.

He runs a highly successful media company, he is slated to inherit even more of his parents' empire once he turns thirty, and yet he still trips over himself like a clumsy schoolboy whenever his heart decides to run things.

Despite his friendships with outgoing and friendly people like Bing and Fitz, and his observations of _their _interactions with those around them, he still can't manage to consistently find that fine line between "shy and introverted" and "tight-lipped and condescending," and he wishes he'd at least developed the ability to make small talk with ladies he's forced to dance with at weddings.

He wonders what would have happened if he hadn't been so uncomfortably awkward during that dance at the Gibson wedding, where she apparently formulated her opinion of him; an opinion that colored all their interactions since then. What if he'd actually tried to make conversation, rather than merely concentrating on how much longer he had until there was no longer an entire room full of strangers staring at him? Had there actually been a time when he'd merely thought of Lizzie as "decent enough"? Because he certainly couldn't fathom it now.

But the past is past and there is no use dwelling. Whatever future hopes he may have had for any kind of relationship between himself and Lizzie Bennet are futile, driven away by his inability to properly express himself and her apparent willingness to make quick judgments on the characters of those she hardly knows.

She is here on business, nothing more. Darcy is determined to be courteous and professional should they encounter each other again; no more than that. Perhaps now that she's here, and he'll get daily doses of what he now knows is her disdain for him, he'll finally be able to get over her.

But her eyes are even lovelier than he remembered.


End file.
